Guardians of the Galaxy 3 Secret Meaning Explained! To get your Doug Rocket tee, GO HERE → https://screencrushmerch.com/

GOTG 3 is maybe the best film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. But it stands above the rest of the MCU because of its many themes: Religion, Trauma, Empathy, and Utopanism. In this video essay, we break down these themes and unlock the deeper meaning of the film.

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Written and Hosted by Ryan Arey (  / ryanarey  )
Edited by Harriet Lengel-Enright, Randolf Nombrado, and Brianna McLarty

#GuardiansOfTheGalaxy3 #SecretMeaning #Marvel

I want to dive a little bit deeper into Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 3. We’ve made some great theory videos, broken down the ending, the easter eggs–but now I want to get into what the movie really means–and what it is trying to say. The movie is filled with big ideas, like utopianism, eugenics, religion, Genesis, deism, creationism, trauma–and we’re going to unpack all of that. But the uniting theme of the movie is Empathy.

Empathy

James Gunn even spelled this out in a tweet, saying, “At the end of the day, this is a movie about joy & compassion & learning to see beyond the rim of our own worlds & having empathy for all living things.”

Doug: But what does empathy even mean?

It means to understan d and share the feelings of another. In other words, it’s the ability to see the world from someone else’s point of view. Empathy is the great argument killer, and it's the crux of the kind of peaceful society the High Evolutionary is trying to build. The arc of this team over three movies has been to overcome trauma and learn to empathize with others. Like when nebula finally forced Gamora to understand how hard her life has been [clip].

Guardians 1 was about the team setting aside their personal desires to work for the good of a collective. Guardians 2 was about the team overcoming their own personal egos to conquer the Ego. and guardians 3 is about the characters finally understanding one another.

And by the way everyone, before we get too far into this video, I want to show you this very cool dog as a rocket tee shirt.

Doug: Oh my god, that is incredibly cool.

It sure is. We have lots of sweet teas in our merch store, and shopping with us is the best way you can support our channel. Thanks for being here with us, and check out the link in the description below.

This film is filled with people trying to understand one another. Peter tries to explain to Gamora what they had in another life. [clip]. When Bowie lands on Counter-Earth, the team struggles to communicate what they want [ball throw]. And Peter has to find a way to communicate with the bat-woman–at first by screaming at her like a tourist [clip], but eventually through the act of art. Art is actually a great unifier across societies, because it creates something many cultures can empathize with.

And later in the movie, Nebula struggles to communicate with the children, but Drax immediately knows how to speak to kids–first by dancing, but then literally speaking their language.

The character with the greatest arc to learn empathy is Adam warlock. He begins the movie serving the High Evolutionary because he only wants to save HIS civilization, he’s only concerned for HIS people. But then he misunderstands his mom’s order to “show him we mean business,” and he sees how his actions have hurt Blurpp’s feelings. Adam then says, “ I don;t like how that made me feel,” because he empathizes with the pet, and takes him in.

Adam eventually becomes a hero, because Groot empathizes with him. Groot saves his life, saying “everyone deserves a second chance.” All of the guardians have been given a second chance to reinvent their lives–but especially Groot, because he is the son of a tree that sacrificed himself for the others. Groot’s empathy for the warlock not only saves Adam, but it eventually saves Peter when the warlock saves his life. The lesson here is that empathy creates a society where people work together for mutual benefit.

So with this cen tral theme of empathy, Mantis has become the most important character in the movie. Her powers have always been underrated–she is an empath, who can feel the emotions of others. [cip, crying with Drax].

But this power also makes her understand everyone’s emotions even better than they do–she would make a great therapist. For instance, look at the obelisks. The Guardians fought one of these in Volume 2, so we just assume they;re big bloodthirsty monsters. The High Evolutionary issues they’re monsters, so he sics them on the team. But Mantis sees them for who they really are–scared animals that only want to eat batteries.